www.culturalolympics.org.uk

London 2012 Cultural Olympiad and Youth: Inspiring a Generation Kate Rodenhurst

The London 2012 Cultural Olympiad committed to placing young people at its centre, dedicating the majority of its programming to young people and creating new opportunities for young people to be involved, not only as audiences, but as producers and performers Somewhereto_, photo by M. Sethi of the work. This paper looks at the Cultural  Creative Jobs Programme, a programme for unemployed Olympiad’s engagement young people which created 40 with children and young traineeships in cultural people, examining what organisations across London kind of projects developed,  Blaze, a youth led creative and whether any common programme based in Lancashire, themes emerged in relation which resulted in young people to changes in practice and delivering their own two-day outcomes for both young festival people and partners.  Next Generation, National Portrait Gallery’s development The research on which this paper project for young artists linked is based looked into six case to the annual BP Portrait studies: Awards

 Stories of the World, a major  The Itch of the Golden Nit, a national project involving over partnership between Tate, BBC 60 museums, in which young and Aardman Animation, in people created their own which children created their exhibitions own feature film

Culture @ the Olympics, 2013: vol. 15, issue 2, pp.30-51 www.culturalolympics.org.uk

 Big Concert, one of the opening Cultural Olympiad and events of the London 2012 throughout the London 2012 Festival, which saw children Festival appealed to people of all from the Big Noise Orchestra in ages, including children and Raploch perform with Gustavo young people. Dudamel and the Simon Bolivar Orchestra. Beyond the programming of The case studies were based on a accessible events within the documentary review of Cultural Olympiad, a large application forms, evaluation number of projects involved reports and reports to funders children and young people as from each project; face-to-face learners, collaborators and and telephone interviews with creators. Many of the strands of project managers; and in some the Cultural Olympiad and cases through focus groups and London 2012 Festival had telephone interviews with learning and engagement participating young people. programmes running alongside, such as the World Shakespeare Festival’s Shakespeare Challenge, Young People and the which was linked to Arts Award. Cultural Olympiad The Reading Agency ran Story Lab Summer Reading Challenge in Children and young people were 2012, involving 750,000 children enabled to participate in a wide and 98% of UK libraries. Children range of creative activities under were encouraged to read at least the umbrella of the Cultural six books over the summer Olympiad. A variety of holidays, and also participated in approaches were taken to a diverse range of events programming for children and including storytelling and crafts. young people across the country. Film Nation Shorts offered young There were events attractive to people aged 14 to 25 the children and young people opportunity to make their own staged across the UK, from short films, and submit them in children’s opera at Belfast Zoo competition, with the winners (Noye’s Fludde) to BBC’s Hackney being shown at a final awards Weekend 2012, which was the ceremony at BFI Southbank. UK’s largest ticketed free music Somewhereto_ was a national event, broadcast live across BBC programme which linked creative Three and Radio One. Within the young people with the spaces Unlimited programme, a short they needed to make their ideas film and a new play were happen. commissioned, both written to be accessible to deaf and disabled In the North East, the Legacy children. Many events across the Trust UK-funded regional

Rodenhurst, 2013: 2012 Cultural Olympiad and Youth 31 www.culturalolympics.org.uk programme was strategically collaboration between young focused on young people, people and cultural investing over £1 million in 15 organisations. Progression routes projects with aims to bring about were developed and in some a shift in the relationship between cases paid work opportunities young people and the region’s were created within the projects. cultural institutions. Across the rest of the country, all of the regions included young people in Key Themes their Legacy Trust UK funded programming. For example in the Whilst approaches to project South West there was a focus on delivery varied widely across the young people volunteering, case study cohort, the research London ran a dance programme has identified some key ways of within the capital’s schools, and working which featured in a East Midlands staged World Event number of the projects. These Young Artists, a four day festival were: which brought together 1,000 young international artists for a  Creativity and Showcases ten-day event in Nottingham.  Co-production  International projects All of the projects case studied  Digital technologies here aimed to involve young  Leadership development people actively in developing  Paid work and progression their own creative work, and  Hard-to-reach young people provided platforms for them to show it to others, whether online Creativity and Showcases or at live performances, exhibitions and events. Most All of the projects placed a strong experimented with social media emphasis on children and young as a tool for planning and people developing their own high communication, and as a quality creative work and then marketing tool. sharing it with others, whether

through live events and Children’s projects were largely exhibitions or online. concerned with developing new creative skills (such as animation Interviewees highlighted as a or music) and sharing them with significant feature the fact that others. When projects focused on children and young people were young people (typically aged 14 able to learn and develop their and over) rather than children, skills through contact with there was an emphasis on professional artists. Children and developing young people as young people were able to make leaders of their own projects, and work to a very high standard, projects were framed as an equal

Rodenhurst, 2013: 2012 Cultural Olympiad and Youth 32 www.culturalolympics.org.uk which was then showcased on Young people became more high profile platforms, something confident, more independent and which would not have been developed skills and knowledge. possible without the impetus and Organisations gained valuable funding provided by the Cultural insight into how to make their Olympiad. work more attractive to new audiences, were open to working For example Big Concert, which in new ways, and in some cases launched the London 2012 have changed their policies and Festival in Scotland, was practices in response. televised live on BBC Four and shown internationally, and International projects featured extensively in the broadcast and print media. The A number of projects developed Itch of the Golden Nit had a international exchanges and other cinematic release and Leicester collaborations. The entire Stories Square premiere, as well as being of the World project was themed shown on CBBC, and winning a around objects from around the number of awards, including a world in British museum Children’s BAFTA for Interactive. collections, and thus most

projects involved young people Co-production in research and learning about other cultures. For example in A key feature of many projects Brighton Museum, a project was the development of teams of looking at football culture young people, often described by worked with young people in project managers as ‘co- Brighton and Mali. Stories of the producers’ or ‘co-curators’, who World also engaged young people worked alongside arts from ‘source communities’, living organisations, museums and in the UK but with persona